Exhausted Spofforth comes up short of 50m backstroke final

From Ryan Bangs, Sportsbeat, in Rome

GEMMA Spofforth admitted the emotion of her gold medal victory has finally caught up with her at the World Swimming Championships.

EXHAUSTED: New world champion Gemma Spofforth missed out on the 50m backstroke final in Rome

Just 15 hours after her victory in the 100m backstroke, Spofforth missed out on a place in tomorrow's 50m breaststroke.

She still beat her personal best and set a new British record 27.92 seconds but it was only good enough to rank her 13th - with only the top eight advancing.

Russia's Anastasia Zueva set her second world record of the championships clocking 27.38.

She also lowered the 100m backstroke mark in the semi-finals but lost 24 hours later to Spofforth in the final.

"It was a British record and personal best time - it wasn't as quick as I would have liked but I can't complain about that after last night.

"I'm disappointed to miss out on the final but the 50m is not my strongest event. It was pretty hard to prepare because I was up most of last night thinking about my gold medal swim."

Spofforth is next in action in the 200m backstroke heats on Friday.

She has won two prestigious NCAA college titles over the distance in the United States and is ranked fourth in the world with a British record personal best of 2.07.56.

“I’ve got a day to rest and hopefully I will start to come down and refocus on the 200m,” she said.

There was also disappointment for Ellen Gandy – the 17-year old who shot to prominence when she broke the 200m butterfly European record at the British Gas national championships in Sheffield this March.

She looked sluggish in the morning heats but insisted she saving her best for the latter rounds.

However, she could only clock a disappointing 2.08.55 – nearly four seconds slower than her personal best in the semi-finals, finishing 15th fastest.

She also saw Hungary’s Katinka Hosszu rewrite her European record to advance as quickest qualifier.